The Diary of Elliot Parker

My name is Elliot Parker. I’ve recently been sloppy with my thinking and it shows. Adrian kept the promise, and I saw him.

The evening was a bit of an event. A catalyst for a great deal of change.

So, I suppose I should say what happened. I went out with Clover for dinner, which was lovely, but I felt nervous. Which is unusual. But the was a bit of a difference when it came to meeting up with Adrian, who turned up at the meeting point having drunk three double rums. So, I said goodbye to Clover and Adrian and I made our way to the hotel he had wanted to use. On the way he told me about a couple of drunk girls in the pub that had kept interrupting him while he was trying to read. That didn’t make me feel great. Can you blame me I mean come on?

So skip forward to getting into the hotel room, that was around 7.30 ish. We got in, he went to the loo, came out and took out his wallet and gave me back the money for the hotel room, and then gave me more money than what was necessary to use my account to get help with his degree work. I tried to give him the extra and he said it was for doing him a favour and letting him borrow the account. I felt cheap, there is no other way to describe it. We sat and hung out chatting a little but he wanted some things that I didn’t feel capable of doing that evening, I felt a bit guilty and tried to give him what he wanted, but I wasn’t into it or in the right frame of mind, and I felt guilty. And worse than that I felt like I was a let-down, like a disappointment. I shouldn’t have felt like that. I shouldn’t have felt cheap or a disappointment or like I wasn’t living up to expectations. I didn’t want to be the old me that would pander and bend and do what was asked of me. I’ve been trying so hard to put myself first recently, and then I didn’t put myself first and put him first and did what he wanted, and I felt completely unaligned with myself. I wasn’t comfortable and it showed.

We left the room and hotel at 10.30. He wanted to make sure he could get home, the last train and all that. 10.30… 10.30… TEN FUCKING THIRTY!!!! I went from feeling a cheap disappointment to falling of the ledge into numbness. Then I did something stupid on the walk from the hotel to the train station to catch a cab, I told Clover I was on my way home. She went mad, she was fuming angry with him and the feeling cheap, like a let-down and disappointment got worse, it felt tenfold. I felt like pure shit. He then ordered an uber and paid for it instead of letting me get a cab. I got home, walked through the door and finally let the tears flow. I just felt heartbroken, whatever hope I had that his recent behaviour was a sign he had changed was shattered. I had hoped that he had become the man that I had always thought and believed he had the potential to be, but he smashed that hope. Smashed it to teeny tiny little pieces.

I was genuinely mad at Clover for being mad because it made me feel worse. It made me feel worse because she was making the issue I was trying to ignore, the feelings I kept trying to ignore she was waving them in my face. If I hadn’t been confronted with how I should have let myself be feeling I probably would have been able to bury it and hide it and forget about it in time. But no I had to be confronted and it made me feel shite.

She was really mad and I was really hurt.

That put me in a funk the next day I still felt hurt the next day I felt hurt, the day after I felt angry and hurt. I had enough. I decided I was going to get back to being happy, I decided I was definitely going to be happy and he would not stand in my way. How he made me feel was not going to stand in my way.

I deserved better than that.

I deserved much better than how he treated me that night. I deserved better than how he treated me during our relationship, during our break up and the time since. I deserve to be happy, I deserve to live the life I want to live. I had hoped and wished for so long that Adrian and I could sort things out, but that night was the night that the straw broke the camel’s back. I stopped caring if that was ever going to be an option in our future. I stopped wanting him, as he is I stopped wanting him, I wanted and hoped for the man I believed he could be, the man he has the potential to be because he is clearly clueless that he can be exactly who he wants to be that he keeps fighting becoming. He could be great, truly, but he is so keen to keep behaving and acting like a total dickhead. I wish that my hopes hadn’t been shattered and he had been who I thought he had come closer to becoming. It sucked, it hurt, I didn’t deserve that. I finally accepted my self-respect, my self-worth, and more importantly my self-acceptance and self-love.

I am worthy of not feeling hurt, cheap, worthless, a disappointment. I finally accept and acknowledge that on a much deeper level than I have ever done before. I still believe he could become the person he has always had the potential to be. But without becoming that and showing the change consistently, I am not interesting in coming into proximity with him again.

I had three-four days of being in a really low funk before I turned it around, I turned that around so quickly that I know I am getting better at this. It was nice to know that I can do it.